Discounts appear to be limited to ten percent, with a maximum of three technological levels.

And/or a twenty five percent bonus for the budget option.

I have been playing with the idea of using quirks to lower the price. Especially since some of the designs I cooked up for very short range personal transports. As written end up having the range to go cross country and speeds approaching those of a Jet airliner. Some disadvantages on systems do not apply to all craft... such as reduced range is not available for anything under ten spaces.

basically, drop the price and give the vehicle a quirk such as "Short range, or limited altitude.For a hoverboard you could apply " Surface Skimming only" or "limited range" and drop the cost by 20-30%

Gravity skimming might imply that like a balloon, gravitational force or pressure prevents the module from rising beyond a certain point, not that I understand the physics of gravity.

Maybe the anti gravity motor only runs on one speed, and has to be fixed for each planet, which might imply the controller constantly adjusts the field, and running without one places it at a static height, and possibly speed.

Hiker? Camper? You might want to take a look at this one. A beer powder that you add water (and bubbles to) and boom beer on the go. Alaska-based company Pat’s Backcountry Beverages have a way to make beer really portable. You very literally just “add water”. It’s not dehydrated beer. Pat’s says its a new process that creates a waterless beer that has flavor, aroma and alcohol of a microbrew. You mix the concentrate with water, add bubbles with the carbonator bottle, and boom. Beer on the go.

Unlike other concentrate processes, this is not just about making the beer and then “removing” the water afterwards (which is extremely energy inefficient). Instead, our process (patent pending) allows us to start with almost no water, and carefully control the environment of the fermentation. The result… concentrated beer with all the same great taste you’re used to in a premium micro brew. All you do is add water, carbonate (check out our carbonator), and enjoy.

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Thre are several Shotshell firing pistols.they work well for up close and dirty combat since a single .410 shell can put several .30caliber projectiles in the air with one trigger pull...but you can forget accuracy of any sort.
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Sometime in the 1980s Franchi prototyped a submachinegun that fired .410 shotshells. You can see it in Janes Infantry Weapons of the era (maybe 1985-1986 or so). It never went into production but a shell could hold 4 000 buckshot pellets or maybe flechettes (can't remember, I may be conflating it with something else). With high-tech ammo something like that might be an interesting weapon for shipboard engagements.

Outside of the fact they tend to be cheaper and easier to maintain, the popularity of shotguns and autopistols may hang on the fact that unlike gauss and other energy intensive weapons, is that there wouldn't be an energy signature to detect.

GRAPEVINE: US Army Pays $207 Per Pistol to SIG SAUER for M17 Modular Handguns

Posted January 24, 2017

With SIG’s recent win of the $580 million dollar contract for the US Army’s Modular Handgun System pistol, many are asking just how the American outlet of the Swiss-German SIG Sauer could have won such a large contract, especially against what many perceived was the strongest contender, Glock. Some saw the very text of the MHS solicitation as being biased towards SIG’s entry (which I do not think is true), while others assumed some backdoor deal must have occurred.

The answer may be far simpler than that. SIG, having learned its lesson from the XM9 trials where it was beaten by the inferior but cheaper Beretta 92FS, simply underbid the competition. And how! Unconfirmed reports coming from the “writer grapevine” – specifically contacts of Andrew Branca’s – claim that SIG bid just $207 per P320 pistol to win the MHS contract, an incredibly low price even for a bulk order of modern polymer-framed striker-fired handguns. Although the exact quantity of pistols being procured is not known (because the contract is for an indefinite quantity over an indefinite delivery, called “IDIQ”), it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of pistols will be procured. The $580 million dollar figure does not just include those guns, however, but also spares, accessories, and even holsters, all to be procured from SIG Sauer.

The low procurement cost per pistol puts concerns that the M9 was “good enough” and that no pistol should have been selected to replace it essentially to bed: It’s very difficult to imagine that the M9 could have been kept operational for the projected lifespan of the M17 handgun for less than a mere $207 per gun, especially since the M9 uses lifed aluminum frames which eventually need replacing. In the long run – and probably the short run, too – the SIG P320 is likely actually cheaper than keeping the M9 on, especially when one considers just how ludicrously easy the P320 is to maintain when compared to its predecessor!

So let's assume that since this may be over twenty years, plus inflation, that it's two hundred bucks per gun, for an order of a hundred thousand examples to be delivered within a year, of fairly precise engineering, with the expectation while it might be a loss leader, the price is close to cost, manufacturing, overhead and minimal profit.

Purported technological level six, actually introduced just after the Great War, and prominently utilized during the Great Patriotic one, with such examples as the Thompson, Schmeisser and Sten.

That makes it technological level five.

Assault Rifle

The Germans developed and introduced the Sturmgewehr 44 in the middle of the Great Patriotic War, though you could charitably look at it as a prototype; the Avtomat Kalashnikova 47 comes shortly after.

Since that would be after the atomic bomb was dropped, it would be at least technological level six. not seven.

Autorifle

Contemporary to the submachinegun; again, that would be technological level five.